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LIBRARY 

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OF  CALIFORNIA 


REPRINTED    BY    ORDER    OF    THE    UNION    STATE     CENTRAL     COMMITTEE. 

SAN  FRANCISCO,  August  9th,  1866.  ALFRED  BARSTOW,  Secretary. 


V.BWARY 

REPORT 


OF   THE 


JOINT  COMMITTEE  ON  RECONSTRUCTION. 


The  Joint  Committee  of  the  two  Houses  of  Congress  appointed  under  the  con- 
current resolution  of  December  13,  1865,  with  direction  "to  inquire  into  the 
condition  of  the  States  which  formed  the  so-called  Confederate  States  of 
America,  and  report  whether  they  or  any  of  them  are  entitled  to  he  represented 
in  either  House  of  Congress,  with  leave  to  report  by  bill  orotherwise"  ask  leave 
to  report: 

That  they  have  attended  to  the  duty  assigned  them  as  assiduously  as  other 
duties  would  permit,  and  now  submit  to  Congress,  as  the  result  of  their  delibera- 
tions, a  resolution  proposing  amendments  to  the  Constitution,  and  two  bills,  of 
which  they  recommend  the  adoption. 

Before  proceeding  to  set  forth  in  detail  their  reasons  for  the  conclusion  to 
which,  after  great  deliberation,  your  committee  have  arrived,  they  beg  .leave  to 
advert,  briefly,  to  the  course  of  proceedings  they  found  it  necessary  to  adopt, 
and  to  explain  the  reasons  therefor. 

The  resolution  under  which  your  committee  was  appointed  directed  them  to 
inquire  into  the  condition  of  the  Confederate  .  States,  and  report  whether  they 
were  entitled  to  representation  in  Congress.  It  is  obvious  that  such  an  investi- 
gation, covering  so  large  an  extent  of  territory  and  involving  so  many  important 
considerations,  must  necessarily  require  no  trifling  labor,  and  consume  a  very 
considerable  amount  of  time.  It  must  embrace  the  condition  in  which  those 
States  were  left  at  the  close  of  the  war  ;  the  measures  which  have  been  taken 
towards  the  reorganization  of  civil  government,  and  the  disposition  of  the  people 
towards  the  United  States  ;  in  a  word,  their  fitness  to  take  an  active  part  in  the 
administration  of  national  affairs. 

As  to  their  condition  at  the  close  of  the  rebellion,  the  evidence  is  open  to 
all  and  admits  of  no  dispute.  They  were  in  a  state  of  utter  exhaustion. 
Having  protracted  their  struggle  against  federal  authority  until  all  hope  of 
successful  resistance  had  ceased,  and  laid  down  their  arms  only  because 
there  was  no  longer  any  power  to  use  them,  the  people  of  those  States  were 
left  bankrupt  in  their  public  finances,  and  shorn  of  the  private  wealth  which 
had  before  given  them  power  and  influence.  They  were  also  necessarily  in 
a  state  of  complete  anarchy,  without  governments  and  without  the  power  to 
frame  governments  except  by  the  permission  of  those  who  had  been  successful 
in  the  war.  The  President  of.  the  United  States,  in  the  proclamations  under 
which  he  appointed  Provisional  Governors,  and  in  his  various  communications  to 
them,  has,  in  exact  terms,  recognized  the  fact  that  the  people  of  those  States 
were,  when  the  rebellion  was  crushed,  "  deprived  of  all  civil  government,"  and 
must  proceed  to  organize  anew.  In  his  conversation  with  Mr.  Stearns,  of  Mas- 
sachusetts, certified  by  himself,  President  Johnson  said,  "  the  State  institutions 
are  prostrated,  laid  out  on  the  ground,  and  they  must  be  taken  up  and  adapted 


x 


2  RECONSTRUCTION. 

to  the  progress  of  events."  Finding  the  Southern  States  in  this  condition,  and 
Congress  having  failed  to  provide  for  the  contingency,  his  duty  was  obvious. 
As  President  of  the  United  States,  <hejigd  no  .power,  except  to  execute  the  laws 
of  the  land  as  Chief  Magistrate.  'TOest;  *la\v?  gave  him  no  authority  over  the 
subject  of  reorganization,  but  by  the  Constitution  he  was  commander-in-chief  of 
the  army  and  navy  of  the  United  States.  The  Confederate  States  embraced 
a  portion  of  the  people  of  the  Union  who  had  been  in  a  state  of  revolt,  but  had 
been  reduced  to  obedience^  by  force  of  arms.  They  were  in  an  abnormal  condi- 
tion, without  civil  government,  without  commercial  connections,  without  national 
or  international  relations,  and  subject  only  to  martial  law.  By  withdrawing 
their  representatives  in  Congress,  by  renouncing  the  privilege  of  represenation, 
by  organizing  a  separate  government,  and  by  levying  war  against  the  United 
States,  they  destroyed  their  State  Constitutions  in  respect  to  the  vital  principle 
which  connected  their  respective  States  with  the  Union  and  secured  their  fed- 
eral relations ;  and  nothing  of  those  constitutions  was  left  of  which  the  United 
States  were  bound  to  take  notice.  For  four  years  they  had  a  de  facto  govern- 
ment, but  it  was  usurped,  and  illegal.  They  chose  the  tribunal  of  arms  wherein 
to  decide  whether  or  not  it  should  be  legalized,  and  they  were  defeated.  At  the 
close  of  the  rebellion,  therefore,  the  people  of  the  rebellious  States  were  found, 
as  the  President  expresses  it,  "deprived  of  all  civil  government."  • 

Under  this  state  of  affairs,  it  was  plainly  the  duty  of  the  President  to  enforce 
existing  national  laws,  and  to  establish,  as  far  as  he  could,  such  a  system  of 
government  as  might  be  provided  for  by  existing  national  statutes.  As  com- 
mander-in-chief of  a  victorious  army,  it  was  his  duty,  under  the  law  of  nations 
and  the  army  regulations,  to  restore  order,  to  preserve  property,  and  to  protect 
the  people  against  violence  from  any  quarter  until  provision  should  be  made  by 
law  for  their  government.  He  might,  as  President,  assemble  Congress,  and 
submit  the  whole  matter  to  the  law-making  power ;  or  he  might  continue  military 
supervision  and  control  until  Congress  should  assemble  on  its  regular  appointed 
day.  Selecting  the  latter  alternative,  he  proceeded,  by  virtue  of  his  power  as 
commander-in-chief,  to  appoint  Provisional  Governors  over  the  revolted  States. 
These  were  regularly  commissioned,  and  their  compensation  was  paid,  as  the 
Secretary  of  War  States,  "  from  the  appropriation  for  army  contingencies,  because 
the  duties  performed  by  the  parties  were  regarded  as  of  a  temporary  character, 
auxiliary  to  the  withdrawal  of  military  force,  the  disbandment  of  armies,  and 
the  reduction  of  military  expenditure,  by  provisional  organizations  for  the  pro- 
tection of  civil  rights,  the  preservation  of  peace,  and  to  take  the  place  of 
armed  force  in  the  respective  States."  It  cannot,  we  think,  be  contended  that 
these  governors  possessed,  or  could  exercise,  any  but  military  authority.  They 
had  no  power  to  organize  civil  governments,  nor  to  exercise  any  authority 
except  that  which  inhered  in  their  own  persons  under  their  commissions.  Neither 
had  the  President,  as  commander-in-chief,  any  other  than  military  power. 
But  he  was  in  exclusive  possession  of  the  military  authority.  It,  was  for  him 
to  decide  how  far  he  would  exercise  it,  how  far  he  would  relax  it,  when  and  on 
what  terms  he  would  withdraw  it.  He  might  properly  permit  the  people  to  as- 
semble, and  to  initiate  local  governments,  and  to  execute  such  local  laws  as  they 
might  choose  to  frame  not  inconsistent  with,  nor  in  opposition  to,  the  laws  of 
the  United  States.  And,  if  satisfied  that  they  might  safely  be  left  to  them- 
selves, he  might  withdraw  the  military  forces  altogether,  and  leave  the  people 
of  any  or  all  of  these  States  to  govern  themselves  without  his  interference.  In 
the  language  of  the  Secretary  of  State,  in  his  telegram  to  the  Provisional  Gov- 
ernor of  Georgia,  dated  October  28,  1865,  he  might  '^recognize  the  people  of 
any  State  as  having  resumed  the  relations  of  loyalty  to  the  Union,"  and  act  in  his 
military  capacity  on  this  hypothesis.  All  this  was  within  his  own  discretion,  as 
military  commander.  But  it  was  not  for  him  to  decide  upon  the  nature  or  effect 
of  any  system  of  government  which  the  people  of  these  States  might  see  fit  to  adopt. 


REPORT   OP   THE    COMMITTEE.  3 

This  power  is  lodged  by  the  Constitution  in  the  Congress  of  the  United  States, 
that  branch  of  the  government  in  which  is  vested  the  authority  to  fix  the 
political  relations  of  the  States  to  the  Union,  whose  duty  it  is  to  guarantee  to 
each  State  a  republican  form  of  government,  and  to  protect  each  and  all  of  them 
against  foreign  or  domestic  violence,  and  against  each  other.  We  cannot,  there- 
fore, regard  the  various  acts  of  the  President  in  relation  to  the  formation  of 
local  governments  in  the  insurrectionary  States,  and  the  conditions  imposed  by 
him  upon  their  action,  in  any  other  light  than  as  intimations  to  the  people  that, 
as  commander-in-chief  of  the  army  he  would  consent  to  withdraw  military  rule 
just  in  proportion  as  they  should,  by  their  acts,  manifest  a  disposition  to  pre- 
serve order  among  themselves,  establish  governments  denoting  loyalty  to  the 
Union,  and  exhibit  a  settled  determination  to  return  to  their  allegiance,  leaving 
with  the  law-making  power  to  fix  the  terms  of  their  final  restoration  to  all  their 
rights  and  privileges  as  States  of  the  Union.  That  this  was  the  view  of  his 
power  taken  by  the  President  is  evident  from  expressions  to  that  effect  in  the 
communications  of  the  Secretary  of  State  to  the  various  Provisional  Governors, 
and  the  repeated  declarations  of  the  President  himself:  Any  other  supposition 
inconsistent  with  this  would  impute  to  the  President  designs  of  encroachment 
upon  a  co-ordinate  branch  of  the  government,  which  should  not  be  lightly  attrib- 
uted to  the  Chief  Magistrate  of  the  nation. 

When  Congress  assembled  in  December  last  the  people  of  most  of  the  States 
lately  in  rebellion  had,  under  the  advice  of  the  President,  organized  local  govern- 
ments, and  some  of  them  had  acceded  to  the  terms  proposed  by  him.  In  his 
annual  message  he  stated,  in  general  terms,  what  had  been  done,  but  he  did  not 
see  fit  to  communicate  the  details  for  the  information  of  Congress.  While  in 
this  and  in  a  subsequent  message  the  President  urged  the  speedy  restoration 
of  these  States,  and  expressed  the  opinion  that  their  condition  was  such  as  to 
justify  their  restoration,  yet  it  is  quite  obvious  that  Congress  must  either  have 
acted  blindly  on  that  opinion  of  the  President,  or  proceeded  to  obtain  the  inform- 
ation requisite  for  intelligent  action  on  the  subject.  The  impropriety  of  pro- 
ceeding wholly  on  the  judgment  of  any  one  man,  however  exalted  his  station, 
in  a  matter  involving  the  welfare  of  the  republic  in  all  future  time,  or  of  adopt- 
ing any  plan,  coming  from  any  source,  without  fully  understanding  all  its  bear- 
ings and  comprehending  its  full  effect,  was  apparent.  The  first  step,  therefore* 
was  to  obtain  the  required  information.  A  call  was  accordingly  made  on  the 
President  for  the  information  in  his  possession  as  to  what  had  been  done,  in 
order  that  Congress  might  judge  for  itself  as  to  the  grounds  of  the  belief  ex- 
pressed by  him  in  the  fitness  of  States  recently  in  rebellion  to  participate  fully 
in  the  conduct  of  national  affairs.  This  information  was  not  immediately  com- 
municated. When  the  response  was  finally  made,  some  six  weeks  after  your 
committee  had  been  in  actual  session,  it  was  found  that  the  evidence  upon  which 
the  President  seemed  to  have  based  his  suggestions  was  incomplete  and  unsatis- 
factory. Authenticated  copies  of  the  new  constitutions  and  ordinances  adopted 
by  the  conventions  in  three  of  the  States  had  been  submitted,  extracts  from 
newspapers  furnished  scanty  information  as  to  the  action  of  one  other  State,  and 
nothing  appears  to  have  been  communicated  as  to  the  remainder.  There  was 
no  evidence  of  the  loyalty  of  those  who  had  participated  in  these  conventions, 
and  in  one  State  alone  was  any  proposition  made  to  submit  the  action  of  the  con- 
ventions to  the  final  judgment  of  the  people. 

Failing  to  obtain  the  desired  information,  and  left  to  grope  for  light  wherever 
it  might  be  found,  your  committee  did  not  deem  it  either  advisable  or  safe  to 
adopt,  without  further  examination,  the  suggestions  of  the  President,  more 
especially  as  he. had  not  deemed  it  expedient  to  remove  the  military  force, 
to  suspend  martial  law,  or  to  restore  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus,  but  still 
thought  it  necessary  to  exercise  over  the  people  of  the  rebellious  States 
his  military  power  and  jurisdiction.  This  conclusion  derived  still  greater 


4:  RECONSTRUCTION. 

force  from  the  fact,  undisputed,  that  in  all  these  States,  except  Tennessee 
and  perhaps  Arkansas,  the  elections  which  were  held  for  State  officers  and 
members  of  Congress  had  resulted,  almost  universally,  in  the  defeat  of  candi- 
dates who  had  been  true  to  the  Union,  and  in  the  election  of  notorious  and  un- 
pardoned  rebels,  men  who  could  not  take  the  prescribed  oath  of  office,  and  who 
made  no  secret  of  their  hostility  to  the  government  and  the  people  of  the  United 
States.  Under  these  circumstances,  anything  like  hasty  action  would  have  been 
as  dangerous  as  it  was  obviously  unwise.  It  appeared  to  your  committee  that 
but  one  course  remained,  viz :  to  investigate  carefully  and  thoroughly  the  state 
of  feeling  and  opinion  existing  among  the  people  of  these  States ;  to  ascertain 
how  far  their  pretended  loyalty  could  be  relied  upon,  and  thence  to  infer  whether 
it  would  be  safe  to  admit  them  at  once  to  a  full  participation  in  the  government 
they  had  fought  for  four  years  to  destroy.  It  was  an  equally  important  inquiry 
whether  their  restoration  to  their  former  relations  with  the  United  States  should 
only  be  granted  upon  certain  conditions  and  guarantees  which  would  effectually 
secure  the  nation  against  a  recurrence  of  evils  so  disastrous  as  those  from  which 
it.  had  escaped  at  so  enormous  a  sacrifice. 

To  obtain  the  necessary  information,  recourse  could  only  be  had  to  the  exam- 
ination of  witnesses  whose  position  had  given  them  the  best  means  of  forming 
an  accurate  judgment,  who  could  state  facts  from  their  own  observation,  and 
whose  character  and  standing  afforded  the  best  evidence  of  their  truthfulness 
and  impartiality.  A  work  like  this,  covering  so  large  an  extent  of  territory, 
and  embracing  such  complicated  and  extensive  inquiries,  necessarily  required 
much  time  and  labor.  To  shorten  the  time  as  much  as  possible,  the  work  was 
divided  and.  placed  in  the  hands  of  four  sub-committees,  who  have  been  dili- 
gently employed  in  its  accomplishment.  The  results  of  their  labors  have  been 
heretofore  submitted,  and  the  country  will  judge  how  far  they  sustain  the  Presi- 
dent's views,  and  how  far  they  justify  the  conclusions  to  which  your  committee 
have  finally  arrived. 

A  claim  for  the  immediate  admission  of  senators  and  representatives  from  the 
so-called  Confederate  States,  has  been  urged,  which  seems  to  your  committee  not 
to  be  founded  either  in  reason  or  in  law,  and  which  cannot  be  passed  without 
comment.  Stated  in  a  few  words,  it  amounts  to  this :  That  inasmuch  as  the 
lately  insurgent  States  had  no  legal  right  to  separate  themselves  from  the  Union, 
they  still  retain  their  positions  as  States,  and  consequently  the  people  thereof 
have  a  right  to  immediate  representation  in  Congress  without  the  imposition  of 
any  conditions  whatever ;  and  further,  that  until  such  admission  Congress  has 
no  right  to  tax  them  for  the  support  of  the  government.  It  has  even  been  con- 
tended that  until  such  admission  all  legislation  affecting  their  interests  is,  if  not 
unconstitutional,  at  least  unjustifiable  and  oppressive. 

It  is  believed  by  your  committee  that  all  these  propositions  are  not  only 
wholly  untenable,  but,  if  admitted,  would  tend  to  the  destruction  of  the  govern- 
ment. 

It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  the  people  of  these  Stetes,  without  justification 
or  excuse,  rose  in  insurrection  against  the  United  States.  They  deliberately 
abolished  their  State  governments  so  far  as  the  same  connected  them  politically 
with  the  Union  as  members  thereof  under  the  Constitution.  They  deliberately 
renounced  their  allegiance  to  the  federal  government,  and  proceeded  to  establish 
an  independent  government  for  themselves.  In  the  prosecution  of  this  enter- 
prise they  seized  the  national  forts,  arsenals,  dock-yards-,  and  other  public  prop- 
erty within  their  borders,  drove  out  from  among  them  those  who  remained  true 
to  the  Union,  and  heaped  every  imaginable  insult  and  injury  upon  the  United 
States  and  its  citizens.  Finally,  they  opened  hostilities,  and  levied  war  against 
the  government.  They  continued  this  war  for  four  years  with  the  most  deter- 
mined and  malignant  spirit,  killing  in  battle,  and  otherwise,  large  numbers  of 
loyal  people,  destroying  the  property  of  loyal  citizens  on  the  sea  and  on  the 


REPORT   OP   THE   COMMITTEE.  5 

land,  and  entailing  on  the  government  an  enormous  debt,  incurred  .to  sustain  its 
rightful  authority.  Whether  legally  and  constitutionally  or  not,  they  did,  in 
fact,  withdraw  from  the  Union  and  made  themselves  subjects  of  another  govern- 
ment of  their  own  creation.  And  they  only  yielded  when,  after  a  long,  bloody, 
and  wasting  war,  they  were  compelled  by  utter  exhaustion  to  lay  down  their 
arms ;  and  this  they  did,  not  willingly,  but  declaring  that  they  yielded  because 
they  could  no  longer  resist,  affording  no  evidence  whatever  of  repentance  for 
their  crime,  and  expressing  no  regret,  except  that  they  had  no  longer  the  power 
to  continue  the  desperate  struggle. 

It  cannot,  we  think,  be  denied  by  any  one  having  a  tolerable  acquaintance 
with  public  law,  that  the  war  thus  waged  was  a  civil  war  of  the  greatest 
magnitude.  The  people  waging  it  were  necessarily  subject  to  all  the  rules 
which,  by  the  law  of  nations,  control  a  contest  of  that  character,  and  to  all  the 
legitimate  consequences  following  it.  One  of  those  consequences  was  that, 
within  the  limits  prescribed  by  humanity,  the  conquered  rebels  were  at  the  mercy 
of  the  conquerers.  That  a  government  thus  outraged  had  a  most  perfect  right 
to  exact  indemnity  for  the  injuries  done,  and  security  against  the  recurrence  of 
such  outrages  in  the  future,  would  seem  too  clear  for  dispute.  What  the  nature 
of  that  security  should  be,  what  proof  should  be  required  of  a  return  to  allegi- 
ance, what  time  should  elapse  before  a  people  thus  demoralized  should  be  re- 
stored in  full  to  the  enjoyment  of  political  rights  and  privileges,  are  questions 
for  the  law-making  power  to  decide,  and  that  decision  must  depend  on  grave 
considerations  of  the  public  safety  and  the  general  welfare. 

It  is  moreover  contended,,  and  with  apparent  gravity,  that,  from  the  peculiar 
nature  and  character  of  our  government,  no  such  right  on  the  part  of  the 
conquerer  can  exist ;  that  from  the  moment  when  rebellion  lays  down  its  arms 
and  actual  hostilities  cease,  all  political  rights  of  rebellious  communities  are  at 
once  restored ;  that,  because  the  people  of  a  State  of  the  Union  were  once  an  or- 
ganized community  within  the  Union,  they  necessarily  so  remain,  and  their  right 
to  be  represented  in  Congress  at  any  and  all  times,  and  to  participate  in  the  gov- 
ernment of  the  country  under  all  circumstances,  admits  of  neither  question  nor 
dispute.  If  this  is  indeed  true,  then  is  the  government  of  the  United  States 
powerless  for  its  own  protection,  and  flagrant  rebellion,  carried  to  the  extreme 
of  civil  war,  is  a  pastime  which  any  State  may  play  at,  not  only  certain  that  it 
can  lose  nothing  in  any  event,  but  may  even  be  the  gainer  by  defeat.  If  re- 
bellion succeeds,  it  accomplishes  its  purpose  and  destroys  the  government.  If 
it  fails,  the  war  has  been  Darren  of  results,  and  the  battle  may  be  still  fought  out 
in  the  legislative  halls  of  the  country.  Treason,  defeated  in  the  field,  has  only 
to  take  possession  of  Congress  and  the  cabinet. 

Your  committee  do  not  deem  it  either  necessary  or  proper  to  discuss  the  ques- 
tion whether  the  late  Confederate  States  are  still  States  of  this  Union,  or  can  ever 
be  otherwise.  Granting  this  profitless  abstraction  about  which  so  many  words 
have  been  wasted,  it  by  no  means  follows  that  the  people  of  those  States  may 
not  place  themselves  in  a  condition  to  abrogate  the  powers  and  privileges  inci- 
dent to  a  State  of  the  Union,  and  deprive  themselves  of  all  pretence  of  right  to 
exercise  those  powers  and  enjoy  those  privileges.  A  State  within  the  Union  has 
obligations  to  discharge  as  a  member  of  the  Union.  It  must  submit  to  federal 
laws  and  uphold  federal  authority.  It  must  have  a  government  republican  in 
form,  under  and  by  which  it  is  connected  with  the  general  government,  and 
through  which  it  can  discharge  its  obligations.  It  is  more  than  idle,  it  is  a 
mockery  to  contend  that  a  people  who  have  thrown  off  their  allegiance,  destroyed 
the  local  government  which  bound  their  States  to  the  Union  as  members  thereof, 
defied  its  authority,  refused  to  execute  its  laws,  and  abrogated  every  provision 
which  gave  them  political  rights  within  the  Union,  still  retain,  through  all,  the 
perfect  and  entire  right  to  resume  at  their  own  will  and  pleasure,  all  their  priv- 
ileges within  the  Union,  and  especially  to  participate  in  its  government,  and  to 


6  RECONSTRUCTION. 

control  the  conduct  of  its  affairs.  To  admit  such  a  principle  for  one  moment 
would  be  to  declare  that  treason  is  always  master  and  loyalty  a  blunder.  Such 
a  principle  is  void  by  its  very  nature  and  essence,  because  inconsistent  with  the 
theory  of  government,  and  fatal  to  its  very  existence. 

On  the  contrary,  we  assert,  that  no  portion  of  the  people  of  this  country, 
whether  in  State  or  Territory,  have  the  right,  while  remaining  on  its  soil,  to 
withdraw  from  or  Deject  the  authority  of  the  United  States.  They  must  obey 
its  laws  as  paramount,  and  acknowledge  its  jurisdiction.  They  have  no  right 
to  secede ;  and  while  they  can  destroy  their  State  governments,  and  place  them- 
selves beyond  the  pale  of  the  Union,  so  far  as  the  exercise  of  State  privileges 
is  concerned,  they  cannot  escape  the  obligations  imposed  upon  them  by  the 
Constitution  and  the  laws,  nor  impair  the  exercise  of  national  authority.  The 
Constitution,  it  will  be  observed,  does  not  act  upon  States,  as  such,  but  upon 
the  people ;  while,  therefore,  the  people  cannot  escape  its  authority,  the  States 
may,  through  the  act  of  their  people,  cease  to  exist  in  an  organized  form,  and 
thus  dissolve  their  political  relations  with  the  United  States. 

That  taxation  should  be  only  with  the  consent  of  the  taxed,  through  their  own 
representatives,  is  a  cardinal  principle  of  all  free  governments ;  but  it  is  not 
.true  that  taxation  and  representation  must  go  together  under  all  circumstances, 
And  at  every  moment  of  time.  The  people  of  the  District  of  Columbia  and  of 
the  Territories  are  taxed,  although  not  represented  in  Congress.  If  it  is  true 
that  the  people  of  the  so-called  Confederate  States  had  no  right  to  throw  off  the 
authority  of  the  United  States,  it  is  equally  true  that  they  are  bound  at  all  times 
to  share  the  burdens  of  government.  They  cannot,  either  legally  or  equitably, 
refuse  to  bear  their  just  proportion  of  these  burdens  by  voluntarily  abdicating 
their  rights  and  privileges  as  States  of  the  Union,  and  refusing  to  be  represented 
in  the  councils  of  the  nation,  much  less  by  rebellion  against  national  authority 
and  levying  war.  To  hold  that  by  so  doing  they  could  escape  taxation  would 
be  to  offer  a  premium  for  insurrection — to  reward  instead  of  punishing  treason. 
To  hold  that  as  soon  as  government  is  restored  to  its  full  authority  it  can  be 
allowed  no  time  to  secure  itself  against  similar  wrongs  in  the  future,  or  else  omit 
the  ordinary  exercise  of  its  constitutional  power  to  compel  equal  contribution 
from  all,  towards  the  expenses  of  government,  would  be  unreasonable  in  itself, 
and  unjust  to  the  nation.  It  is  sufficient  to  reply  that  the  loss  of  representation 
by  the  people  of  the  insurrectionary  States  was  their  own  voluntary  choice. 
They  might  abandon  their  privileges,  but  they  could  not  escape  their  obligations ; 
and  surely  they  have  no  right  to  complain  if,  before  resuming  those  privileges, 
and  while  the  people  of  the  United  States  are  devising  measures  for  the  public 
safety,  rendered  necessary  by  the  acts  of  those  who  thus  disfranchised  themselves, 
they  are  compelled  to  contribute  their  just  proportion  of  the  general  burden  of 
taxation  incurred  by  their  wickedness  and  folly. 

Equally  absurd  is  the  pretence  that  the  legislative  authority  of  the  nation 
must  be  inoperative  so  far  as  they  are  concerned,  while  they,  by  their  own  act, 
have  lost  the  right  to  take  part  in  it.  Such  a  proposition  carries  its  own  refuta- 
tion on  its  face. 

While  thus  exposing  fallacies  which,  as  your  committee  believe,  are  resorted 
to  for  the  purpose  of  misleading  the  people  and  distracting  their  attention  from 
the  questions  at  issue,  we  freely  admit  that  such  a  condition  of  things  should  be 
brought,  if  possible,  to  a  speedy  termination.  It  is  most  desirable  that  the  Union 
of  all  the  States  should  become  perfect  at  the  earliest  moment  consistent  with 
the  peace  and  welfare  of  the  nation  ;  that  all  these  States  should  become  fully 
represented  in  the  national  councils,  and  take  their  share  in  the  legislation  of 
the  country.  The  possession  and  exercise  of  more  than  its  just  share  of  power 
by  any  section  is  injurious,  as  well  to  that  section  as  to  all  others.  Its  tendency 
is  distracting  and  demoralizing,  and  such  a  state  of  affairs  is  only  to  be  tolerated 
on  the  ground  of  a  necessary  regard  to  the  public  safety.  As  soon  as  that  safety 
is  secured  it  should  terminate. 


REPORT   OF   THE   COMMITTEE.  7 

Your  committee  came  to  the  consideration  of  the  subject  referred  to  them  with 
the  most  anxious  desire  to  ascertain  what  was  the  condition  of  the  people  of  the 
States  recently  in  insurrection,  and  what,  if  anything,  was  necessary  to  be  done 
before  restoring  them  to  the  full  enjoyment  of  all  their  original  privileges.  It 
was  undeniable  that  the  war  into  which  they  had  plunged  the  country  had 
materially  changed  their  relations  to  the  people  of  the  loyal  States.  Slavery 
had  been  abolished  by  constitutional  amendment.  A  large  proportion  of  the 
population  had  become,  instead  of  mere  chattels,  free  men  and  citizens.  Through 
all  the  past  struggle  these  had  remained  true  and  loyal,  and  had,  in  large  num- 
bers, fought  on  the  side  of  the  Union.  It  was  impossible  to  abandon  them,  with- 
out securing  them  their  rights  as  free  men  and  citizens.  The  whole  civilized 
world  would  have  cried  out  against  such  base  ingratitude,  and  the  bare  idea  is 
offensive  to  all  right-thinking  men.  Hence  it  became  important  to  inquire  what 
could  be  done  to  secure  their  rights,  civil  and  political.  It  was  evident  to  your 
committee  that  adequate  security  could  only  be  found  in  appropriate  constitu- 
tional provisions.  By  an  original  provision  of  the  Constitution,  representation 
is  based  on  the  whole  number  of  free  persons  in  each  State,  and  three-fifths  of 
all  other  persons.  When  all  become  free,  representation  for  all  necessarily 
follows.  As  a  consequence,  the  inevitable  effect  of  the  rebellion  would  be  to 
increase  the  political  power  of  the  insurrectionary  States,  whenever  they  should 
be  allowed  to  resume  their  positions  as  States  of  the  Union.  As  representation 
is  by  the  Constitution  based  upon  population,  your  committee  did  not  think  it  ad- 
visable to  recommend  a  change  of  that  basis.  The  increase  of  representation 
necessarily  resulting  from  the  abolition  of  slavery  was  considered  the  most  im- 
portant element  in  the  questions  arising  out  of  the  changed  condition  of  affairs, 
and  the  necessity  for  some  fundamental  action  in  this  regard  seemed  imperative. 
It  appeared  to  your  committee  that  the  rights  of  these  persons  by  whom  the 
basis  of  representation  had  been  thus  increased  should  be  recognized  by  the 
general  government.  While  slaves  they  were  not  considered  as  having  any 
rights,  civil  or  political.  It  did  not  seem  just  or  proper  that  all  the  political 
advantages  derived  from  their  becoming  free  should  be  confined  to  their  former 
masters,  who  had  fought  against  the  Union,  and  withheld  from  themselves  who 
had  always  been  loyal.  Slavery,  by  building  up  a  ruling  and  dominant  class, 
had  produced  a  spirit  of  oligarchy  adverse  to  republican  institutions,  which  finally 
inaugurated  civil  war.  The  tendency  of  continuing  the  domination  of  such  a  class, 
by  leaving  it  in  the  exclusive  possession  of  political  power,  would  be  to  encourage 
the  same  spirit,  and  lead  to  a  similar  result.  Doubts  were  entertained  whether 
Congress  had  power,  even  under  the  amended  Constitution,  to  prescribe  the 
qualifications  of  voters  in  a  State,  or  could  act  directly  on  the  subject.  It  was 
doubtful,  in  the  opinion  of  your  committee,  whether  the  States  would  consent  to 
surrender  a  power  they  had  always  exercised,  and  to  which  they  were  attached. 
As  the  best  if  not  the  only  method  of  surmounting  the  difficulty,  and  as  eminently 
just  and  proper  in  itself,  your  committee  came  to  the  conclusion  that  political  power 
should  be  possessed  in  all  the  States  exactly  in  proportion  as  the  right  of  suffrage 
should  be  granted  without  distinction  of  color  or  race.  This  it  was  thought 
would  leave  the  whole  question  with  the  people  of  each  State,  holding  out  to  all 
the  advantange  of  increased  political  power  as  an  inducement  to  allow  all  to 
participate  in  its  exercise.  Such  a  provision  would  be  in  its  nature  gentle  and 
persuasive,  and  would  lead,  it  was  hoped,  at  no  distant  day,  to  an  equal  partici- 
pation of  all,  without  distinction,  in  all  the  rights  and  privileges  of  citizenship, 
thus  affording  a  full  and  adequate  protection  to  all  classes  of  citizens,  since  all 
would  have,  through  the  ballot-box,  the  power  of  self-protection. 

Holding  these  views,  your  committee  prepared  an  amendment  to  the  Consti- 
tution to  carry  out  this  idea,  and  submitted  the  same  to  Congress.  Unfortu- 
nately, as  we  think,  it  did  not  receive  the  necessary  constitutional  support  in 
the  Senate,  and  therefore  could  not  be  proposed  for  adoption  by  the  States. 


8  RECONSTRUCTION. 

The  principle  involved  in  that  amendment  is,  however,  believed  to  be  sound, 
and  jour  committee  have  again  proposed  it  in  another  form,  hoping  that  it  may 
receive  the  approbation  of  Congress. 

Your  committee  have  been  unable  to  find,  in  the  evidence  submitted  to  Con- 
gress by  the  President,  under  date  of  March  6,  1866,  in  compliance  with  the 
resolutions  of  January  5  and  February  27,  1866,  any  satisfactory  proof  that 
either  of  the  insurrectionary  States,  except,  perhaps,  the  State  of  Tennessee, 
has  placed  itself  in  a  condition  to  resume  its  political  relations  to  the  Union. 
The  first  step  toward  that  end  would  necessarily  be  the  establishment  of  a  re- 
publican form  of  government  by  the  people.  It  has  been  before  remarked  that 
the  Provisional  Governors,  appointed  by  the  President  in  the  exercise  of  his 
military  authority,  could  do  nothing  by  virtue  of  the  power  thus  conferred 
towards  the  establishment  of  a  State  government.  They  were  acting  under 
the  War  Department  and  paid  out  of  its  funds.  They  were  simply  bridging 
over  the  chasm  between  rebellion  and .  restoration.  And  yet  we  find  them 
calling  conventions  and  convening  legislatures.  Not  only  this,  but  we  find 
the  conventions  and  legislatures  thus  convened  acting  under  executive  di- 
rection as  to  the  provisions  required  to  be  adopted  in  their  constitutions  and 
ordinances  as  conditions  precedent  to  their  recognition  by  the  President.  The 
inducement  held  out  by  the  President  for  compliance  with  the  conditions  im- 
posed was,  directly  in  one  instance,  and  presumably,  therefore,  in  others,  the 
immediate  admission  of  senators  and  representatives  to  Congress.  The  char- 
acter of  the  conventions  and  legislatures  thus  assembled  was  not  such  as  to  in- 
spire confidence  in  the  good  faith  of  their  members.  Governor  Perry,  of  South 
Carolina,  dissolved  the  convention  assembled  in  that  State  before  the  sugges- 
tion had  reached  Columbia  from  Washington  that  the  rebel  war  debt  should  be 
repudiated,  and  gave  as  his  reason  that  it  was  a  "  revolutionary  body."  There 
is  no  evidence  of  the  loyalty  or  disloyalty  of  the  members  of  those  conventions 
and  legislatures  except  the  fact  of  pardons  being  asked  for  on  their  account. 
Some  of  these  States  now  claiming  representation  refused  to  adopt  the  condi- 
tions imposed.  No  reliable  information  is  found  in  these  papers  as  to  the  con- 
stitutional provisions  of  several  of  these  States,  while  in  not  one  of  them  is  there 
the  slightest  evidence  to  show  that  these  "  amended  constitutions,"  as  they  are 
called,  have  ever  been  submitted  to  the  people  for  their  adoption.  In  North 
Carolina  alone  an  ordinance  was  passed  to  that  effect,  but  it  does  not  appear  to 
have  been  acted  on.  Not  one  of  them,  therefore,  has  been  ratified.  Whether, 
with  President  Johnson,  we  adopt  the  theory  that  the  old  constitutions  were  ab- 
rogated and  destroyed,  and  the  people  "deprived  of  all  civil  government,"  or 
whether  we  adopt  the  alternative  doctrine  that  they  were  only  suspended  and 
were  revived  by  the  suppression  of  the  rebellion,  the  new  provisions  must  be 
considered  as  equally  destitute  of  validity  before  adoption  by  the  people.  If 
the  conventions  were  called  for  the  sole  purpose  of  putting  the  State  govern- 
ment into  operation,  they  had  no  power  either  to  adopt  a  new  constitution  or  to 
amend  an  old  one  without  the  consent  of  the  people.  Nor  could  either  a  con- 
vention or  a  legislature  change  the  fundamental  law  without  power  previously 
conferred.  In  the  view  of  your  committee,  it  follows,  therefore,  that  the  people 
of  a  State  where  the  constitution  has  been  thus  amended  might  feel  themselves 
justified  in  repudiating  altogether  all  such  unauthorized  assumptions  of  power, 
and  might  be  expected  to  do  so  at  pleasure. 

So  far  as  the  disposition  of  the  people  of  the  insurrectionary  States,  and  the 
probability  of  their  adopting  measures  conforming  to  the  changed  condition  of 
affairs,  can  be  inferred  from. the  papers  submitted  by  the  President  as  the  basis 
of  his  action,  the  prospects  are  far  from  encouraging.  It  appears  quite  clear  that 
the  anti-slavery  amendments,  both  to  the  State  and  Federal  constitutions,  were 
adopted  with  reluctance  by  the  bodies  which  did  adopt  them,  while  in  some  States 
they  have  been  either  passed  by  in  silence  or  rejected.  The  language  of  all  the 


REPORT   OP   THE    COMMITTEE.  9 

provisions  and  ordinances  of  these  States  on  the  subject  amounts  to  nothing 
more  than  an  unwilling  admission  of  an  unwelcome  truth.  As  to  the  ordinance 
of  secession,  it  is,  in  some  cases,  declared  "null  and  void,"  and  in  others  simply 
"  repealed ;"  and  in  no  instance  is  a  refutation  of  this  deadly  heresy  considered 
worthy  of  a  place  in  the  new  constitution. 

If,  as  the  President  assumes,  these  insurrectionary  States  were,  at  the  close 
of  the  war,  wholly  without  State  governments,  it  would  seem  that,  before  being 
admitted  to  participation  in  the  direction  of  public  affairs,  such  governments 
should  be  regularly  organized.  Long  usage  has  established,  and  numerous 
statutes  have  pointed  out,  the  mode  in  which  this  should  be  done.  A  conven- 
tion to  frame  a  form  of  government  should  be  assembled  under  competent 
authority.  Ordinarily,  this  authority  emanates  from  Congress ;  but,  under  the 
peculiar  circumstances,  your  committee  is  not  disposed  to.  criticise  the  Presi- 
dent's action  in  assuming  the  power  exercised  by  him  in  this  regard.  The  con- 
vention, when  assembled,  should  frame  a  constitution  of  government,  which 
should  be  submitted  to  the  people  for  adoption.  If  adopted,  a  legislature  should 
be  convened  to  pass  the  laws  necessary  to  carry  it  into  effect.  When  a  State, 
thus  organized,  claims  representation  in  Congress,  the  election  of  representa- 
tives should  be  provided  for  by  law,  in  accordance  with  the  laws  of  Congress 
regulating  representation,  and  the  proof  that  the  action  taken  has  been  in  con- 
formity to  law  should  be  submitted  to  Congress. 

In  no  case  have  the^e  essential  preliminary  steps  been  taken.  The  conven- 
tions assembled  seem  to  have  assumed  that  the  constitutions  which  had  been 
repudiated  and  overthrown  were  still  in  existence,  and  operative  to  constitute 
the  States  members  of  the  Union,  and  to  have  contented  themselves  with  such 
amendments  as  they  were  informed  were  requisite  in  order  to  insure  their  return 
to  an  immediate  participation  in  the  Government  of  the  tlnited  States.  Not 
waiting  to  ascertain  whether  the  people  they  represented  would  adopt  even  the 
proposed  amendments,  they  at  once  ordered  elections  of  representatives  to 
Congress,  in  nearly  all  instances  before  an  executive  had  been  chosen  to  issue 
writs  of  election  under  the  State  laws,  and  such  elections  as  were  held  were 
ordered  by  the  conventions.  In  one  instance  at  least  the  writs  of  election  were 
signed  by  the  Provisional  governor.  Glaring  irregularities,  and  unwarranted 
assumptions  of  power,  are  manifest  in  several  cases,  particularly  in  South  Caro- 
lina, where  the  convention,  although  disbanded  by  the  Provisional  Governor  on 
the  ground  that  it  was  a  revolutionary  body,  assumed  to  redistrict  the  State. 

It  is  quite  evident  from  all  these  facts,  and  indeed  from  the  whole  mass  of 
testimony  submitted  by  the  President  to  the  Senate,  that  in  no  instance  was  re- 
gard paid  to  any  other  consideration  than  obtaining  immediate  admission  to 
Congress,  under  the  barren  form  of  an  election  in  which  no  precautions  were 
taken  to  secure  regularity  of  proceedings,  or  the  assent  of  the  people.  No  con- 
stitution has  been  legally  adopted  except,  perhaps,  in  the  State  of  Tennessee, 
and  such  elections  as  have  been  held  were  without  authority  of  law.  Your 
committee  are  accordingly  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  the  States  referred  to 
have  not  placed  themselves  in  a  condition  to  claim  representation  in  Congress, 
unless  all  the  rules  which  have,  since  the  foundation  of  the  government  been 
deemed  essential  in  such  cases,  should  be  disregarded.  MfMCHcrr  LJ*«ARY 

It  would  undoubtedly  be  competent  for  Congress  to  waive  aTTIormalities  and 
to  admit  these  Confederate  States  to  representation  at  once,  trusting  that  time 
and  experience  would  set  all  things  right.  Whether  it  would  be  advisable  to 
do  so,  however,  must  depend  upon  other  considerations  of  which  it  remains  to 
treat.  But  it  may  well  be  observed,  that  the  inducements  to  such  a  step  should 
be  of  the  very  highest  character.  It  seems  to  your  committee  not  unreasonable 
to  require  satisfactory  evidence  that  the  ordinances  and  constitutional  provisions 
which  the  President  deemed  essential  in  the  first  instance  will  be  permanently 
adhered  to  by  the  people  of  the  States  seeking  restoration,  after  being  admitted 


10  KECONSTKUCTION. 

to  full  participation  in  the  government,  and  will  not  be  repudiated  when  that 
object  shall  have  been  accomplished.  And  here  the  burden  of  proof  rests  upon 
the  late  insurgents  who  are  seeking  restoration  to  the  rights  and  privileges 
which  they  willingly  abandoned,  and  not  upon  the  people  of  the  United  States 
who  have  never  undertaken,  directly  or  indirectly,  to  deprive  them  thereof.  It 
should  appear  affirmatively  that  they  are  prepared  and  disposed  in  good  faith  to 
accept  the  results  of  the  war,  to  abandon  their  hostility  to  the  government,  and 
to  live  in  peace  and  amity  with  the  people  of  the  loyal  States,  extending  to  all 
classes  of  citizens  equal  rights  and  privileges,  and  conforming  to  the  republican 
idea  of  liberty  and  equality.  They  should  exhibit  in  their  acts  something 
more  than  an  unwilling  submission  to  an  unavoidable  necessity — a  feeling,  if 
not  cheerful,  certainly  not  offensive  and  defiant.  And  they  should  evince  an 
entire  repudiation  of  all  hostility  to  the  general  government,  by  an  acceptance 
of  such  just  and  reasonable  conditions  as  that  government  should  think  the 
public  safety  demands.  Has  this  been  done  ?  Let  us  look  at  the  facts  shown 
by  the  evidence  taken  by  the  committee. 

Hardly  is  the  war  closed  before  the  people  of  these  insurrectionary  States 
come  forward  and  haughtily  claim,  as  a  right,  the  privilege  of  participating  at 
once  in  that  government  which  they  had  for  four  years  been  fighting  to  over-  • 
throw.  Allowed  and  encouraged  by  the  Executive  to  organize  State  govern- 
ments, they  at  once  place  in  power  leading  rebels,  unrepented  and  unpardoned, 
excluding  with  contempt  those  who  had  manifested  an  attachment  to  the  Union, 
arid  preferring,  in  many  instances,  those  who  had  rendered  themselves  the  most 
obnoxious.  In  the  face  of  the  law  requiring  an  oath  which  would  necessarily 
exclude  all  such  men  from  federal  offices,  they  elect,  with  very  few  exceptions, 
as  senators  and  representatives  in  Congress,  men  who  had  actively  participated 
in  the  rebellion,  insultingly  denouncing  the  law  as  unconstitutional.  It  is  only 
necessary  to  instance  the  election  to  the  Senate  of  the  late  Vice-President  of  the 
Confederacy,  a  man  who,  against  his  own  declared  convictions,  had  lent  all  the 
weight  of  his  acknowledged  ability  and  of  his  influence  as  a  most  prominent 
public  man  to  the  cause  of  the  rebellion,  and  who,  unpardoned  rebel  as  he  is, 
with  that  oath  staring  him  in  the  face,  had  the  assurance  to  lay  his  credentials 
on  the  table  of  the  Senate.  Other  rebels  of  scarcely  less  note  or  notoriety  were 
selected  from  other  quarters.  Professing  no  repentance,  glorying  apparently  in 
the  crime  they  had  committed,  avowing  still,  as  the  uncontradicted  testimony  of 
Mr.  Stevens  and  many  others  proves,  an  adherance  to  the  pernicious  doctrine 
of  secession,  and  declaring  that  they  yielded  only  to  necessity,  they  insist,  with 
unanimous  voice,  upon  their  rights  as  States,  and  proclaim  that  they  will  sub- 
mit to  no  conditions  whatever  as  preliminary  to  their  resumption  of  power 
under  that  Constitution  which  they  still  claim  the  right  to  repudiate. 

Examining  the  evidence  taken  by  your  committee  still  further,  in  connection 
with  facts  too  notorious  to  be  disputed,  it  appears  that  the  Southern  press,  with 
few  exceptions,  and  those  mostly  of  newspapers  recently  established  by  Northern 
men,  abounds  with  weekly  and  daily  abuse  of  the  institutions  and  people  of  the 
loyal  States  ;  defends  the  men  who  led,  and  the  principles  which  incited,  the  re- 
bellion ;  denounces  and  reviles  Southern  men  who  adhered  to  the  Union  ;  and 
strives,  constantly  and  unscrupulously,  by  every  means  in  its  power,  to  keep 
alive  the  fire  of  hate  and  discord  between  the  sections  ;  calling  upon  the  Presi- 
dent to  violate  his  oath  of  office,  overturn  the  government  by  force  of  arms,  and 
drive  the  representatives  of  the  people  from  their  seats  in  Congress.  The 
national  banner  is  openly  insulted,  and  the  national  airs  scoffed  at,  not  only  by 
an  ignorant  populace,  but  at  public  meetings,  and  once,  among  other  notable  in- 
stances, at  a  dinner  given  in  honor  of  a  notorious  rebel  who  had  violated  his  oath 
and  abandoned  his  flag.  The  same  individual  is  elected  to  an  important  office 
in  the  leading  city  of  his  State,  although  an  unpardoned  rebel,  and  so  offensive 
that  the  President  refuses  to  allow  him  to  enter  upon  his  official  duties.  In  an- 


KEPORT   OF   THE   COMMITTEE.  11 

other  State  the  leading  General  of  the  rebel  armies  is  openly  nominated  for  Gov- 
ernor by  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Delegates,  and  the  nomination  is  hailed 
by  the  people  with  shouts  of  satisfaction,  and  openly  indorsed  by  the  press.  \ 

Looking  still  further  at  the  evidence  taken  by  your  committee,  it  is  found  to 
be  clearly  shown  by  witnesses  of  the  highest  character,  and  having  the  best 
means  of  observation,  that  the  Freedmen's  Bureau,  instituted  for  the  relief  and 
protection  of  freedmen  and  refugees,  is  almost  universally  opposed  by  the  mass 
of  the  population,  and  exists  in  an  efficient  condition  only  under  military  pro- 
tection, while  the  Union  men  of  the  South  are  earnest  in  its  defense,  declaring 
with  one  voice  that  without  its  protection  the  colored  people  would  not  be  per- 
mitted to  labor  at  fair  prices,  and  could  hardly  live  in  safety.  They  also  testify 
that  without  the  protection  of  the  United  States  troops,  Union  men,  whether  of 
Northern  or  Southern  origin,  would  be  obliged  to  abandon  their  homes.  The 
feeling  in  many  portions  of  the  country  towards  emancipated  slaves,  especially 
among  the  uneducated  and  ignorant,  is  one  of  vindictive  and  malicious  hatred. 
This  deep-seated  prejudice  against  color  is  assiduously  cultivated  by  the  public 
journals,  and  leads  to  acts  of  cruelty,  oppression,  and  murder,  which  the  local 
authorities  are  at  no  pains  to  prevent  or  punish.  There  is  no  general  disposition 
to  place  the  colored  race,  constituting  at  least  two-fifths  of  the  population,  upon 
terms  even  of  civil  equality.  While  many  instances  may  be  found  where  large 
planters  and  men  of  the  better  class  accept  the  situation,  and  honestly  strive  to 
bring  about  a  better  order  of  things,  by  employing  the  freedmen  at  fair  wages 
and  treating  them  kindly,  the  general  feeling  and  disposition  among  all  classes 
are  yet  totally  averse  to  the  toleration  of  any  class  of  people  friendly  to  the 
Union,  be  they  white  or  black ;  and  this  aversion  is  not  unfrequently  manifested 
in  an  insulting  and  offensive  manner. 

The  witnesses  examined  as  to  the  willingness  of  the  people  of  the  South  to 
contribute,  under  existing  laws,  to  the  payment  of  the  national  debt,  prove  that 
the  taxes  levied  by  the  United  States  will  be  paid  only  on  compulsion,  and  with 
great  reluctance,  while  there  prevails,  to  a  considerable  extent,  an  expectation 
that  compensation  will  be  made  for  slaves  emancipated  and  property  destroyed 
during  the  war.  The  testimony  on  this  point  comes  from  officers  of  the  Union 
army,  officers  of  the  late  rebel  army,  Union  men  of  the  Southern  States,  and 
avowed  secessionists,  almost  all  of  whom  state  that,  in  their  opinion,  the  people 
of  the  rebellious  States  would,  if  they  should  see  a  prospect  of  success,  repu- 
diate the  national  debt. 

While  there  is  scarcely  any  hope  or  desire  among  leading  men  to  renew  the 
attempt  at  secession  at  any  future  time,  there  is  still,  according  to  a  large  num- 
ber of  witnesses,  including  A.  H.  Stevens,  who  may  be  regarded  as  good 
authority  on  that  point,  a  generally  prevailing  opinion  which  defends  the  legal 
right  of  secession,  and  upholds  the  doctrine  that  the  first  allegiance  of  the  people 
is  due  to  the  States,  and  not  to  the  United  States.  This  belief  evidently  pre- 
vails among  leading  and  prominent  men,  as  well  as  among  the  masses  every 
where,  except  in  some  of  the  northern  counties  of  Alabama  and  the  eastern 
counties  of  Tennessee. 

The  evidence  of  an  intense  hostility  to  the  Federal  Union,  and  an  equally  in- 
tense love  of  the  late  Confederacy,  nurtured  by  the  war,  is  decisive.  While  it 
appears  that  nearly  all  are  willing  to  submit,  at  least  for  the  time  being,  to  the 
Federal  authority,  it  is  equally  clear  that  the  ruling  motive  is  a  desire  to  obtain 
the  advantages  which  will  be  derived  from  a  representation  in  Congress.  Officers 
of  the  Union  army  on  duty,  and  Northern  men  who  go  South  to  engage  in  busi- 
ness, are  generally  detested  and  proscribed.  Southern  men  who  adhered  to 
the  Union  are  bitterly  hated  and  relentlessly  persecuted.  In  some  localities 
prosecutions  have  been  instituted  in  State  courts  against  Union  officers  for  acts 
done  in  the  line  of  official  duty,  and  similar  prosecutions  are  threatened  else- 
where as  soon  as  the  United  States  troops  are  removed.  All  such  demonstra- 


12  RECONSTRUCTION. 

tions  show  a  state  of  feeling  against  which  it  is  unmistakably  necessary  to  guard. 
The  testimony  is  conclusive  that  after  the  collapse  of  the  Confederacy  the 
feeling  of  the  people  of  the  rebellious  States  was  that  of  abject  submission. 
Having  appealed  to  the  tribunal  of  arms,  they  had  no  hope  except  that  by  the 
magnanimity  of  their  conquerors  their  lives,  and  possibly  their  property,  might 
be  preserved.  Unfortunately,  the  general  issue  of  pardons  to  persons  who  had 
been  prominent  in  the  rebellion,  and  the  feeling  of  kindliness  and  conciliation 
manifested  by  the  Executive,  and  very  generally  indicated  through  the  North- 
ern press,  had  the  effect  to  render  whole  communities  forgetful  of  the  crime  they 
had  committed,  defiant  towards  the  Federal  Government,  and  regardless  of  their 
duties  as  citizens.  The  conciliatory  measures  of  the  Government  do  not  seem 
to  have  been  met  even  halfway.  The  bitterness  and  defiance  exhibited  toward 
the  United  States  under  such  circumstances  is  without  a  parallel  in  the  history 
of  the  world.  In  return  for  our  leniency  we  receive  only  an  insulting  denial 
of  our  authority.  In  return  for  our  kind  desire  for  the  resumption  of  fraternal 
relations  we  receive  only  an  insolent  assumption  of  rights  and  privileges  long 
since  forfeited.  The  crime  we  have  punished  is  paraded  as  a  virtue,  and  the 
principles  of  republican  government,  which  we  have  vindicated  at  so  terrible  a 
cost  are  denounced  as  unjust  and  oppressive. 

If  we  add  to  this  evidence  the  fact  that,  although  peace  has  been  declared  by 
the  President,  he  has  not,  to  this  day,  deemed  it  safe  to  restore  the  writ  of 
habeas  corpus,  to  relieve  the  insurrectionary  States  of  martial  law,  nor  to  with- 
draw the  troops  from  many  localities,  and  that  the  commanding  General  deems 
an  increase  of  the  army  indispensable  to  the  preservation  of  order  and  the 
protection  of  loyal  and  well  disposed  people  in  the  South,  the  proof  of  a.  condi- 
tion of  feeling  hostile  to  the  Union  and  dangerous  to  the  Government  through- 
out the  insurrectionary  States  would  seem  to  be  overwhelming. 

With  such  evidence  before  them,  it  is  the  opinion  of  your  committee — 

I.  That  the  States  lately  in  rebellion  were,  at  the  close  of  the  war,  disorgan- 
ized communities,  without  civil  government,  and  without,  constitutions  or  other 
forms,  by  virtue  of  which  political  relations  could  legally  exist  between  them 
and  the  Federal  Government. 

II.  That  Congress  cannot  be  expected  to  recognize  as  valid  the  election  of 
representatives  from  disorganized  communities,  which,  from  the  very  nature  of 
the  case,  were  unable  to  present  their  claim  to  representation  under  those  estab- 
lished and  recognized  rules,  the  observance  of  which  has  been  hitherto  required. 

III.  That  Congress  would  not  be  justified  in  admitting  such  communities  to 
a  participation  in  the  government  of  the  country  without  first  providing  such 
constitutional  or  other  guarantees  as  will  tend  to  secure  the  civil  rights  of  all 
citizens  of  the  republic ;  a  just  equality  of  representation ;  protection  against 
claims  founded  in  rebellion  and  crime ;  a  temporary  restoration  of  the  right  of 
suffrage  to  those  who  have  not  actively  participated  in  the  efforts  to  destroy  the 
Union  and  overthrow  the  Government,  and  the  exclusion  from  positions  of  public 
trust  of,  at  least,  a  portion  of  those  whose  crimes  have  proved  them  to  be  enemies 
to  the  Union,  and  unworthy  of  public  confidence. 

Your  committee  will,  perhaps,  hardly  be  deemed  excusable  for  extending  this 
report  further ;  but,  inasmuch  as  immediate  and  unconditional  representation  of 
the  States  lately  in  rebellion  is  demanded  as  a  matter  of  right,  and  delay  and 
even  hesitation  is  denounced  as  grossly  oppressive  and  unjust,  as  well  as  un- 
wise and  impolitic,  it  may  not  be  amiss  again  to  call  attention  to  a  few  undis- 
puted and  notorious  facts,  and  the  principles  of  public  law  applicable  thereto,, 
in  order  that  the  propriety  of  that  claim  may  be  fully  considered  and  well  un- 
derstood. 

The  State  of  Tennessee  occupies  a  position  distinct  from  all  the  other  insur- 
rectionary States,  and  has  been  the  subject  of  a  separate  report  which  your 
committee  have  not  thought  it  expedient  to  disturb.  Whether  Congress  shall 


REPORT   OF   THE   COMMITTEE.  13 

see  fit  to  make  that  State  the  subject  of  separate  action,  or  to  include  it  in  the 
same  category  with  all  others,  so  far  as  concerns  the  imposition  of  preliminary 
conditions,  it  is  not  within  the  province  of  this  committee  either  to  determine  or 
advise. 

To  ascertain  whether  any  of  the  so-called  Confederate  States  "  are  entitled  to 
be  represented  in  either  house  of  Congress,"  the  essential  inquiry  is,  whether 
there  is,  in  any  one  of  them,  a  constituency  qualified  to  be  represented  in  Con- 
gress. The  question  how  far  persons  claiming  seats  in  either  house  possess  the 
credentials  necessary  to  enable  them  to  represent  a  duly  qualified  constituency 
is  one  for  the  consideration  of  each  house  separately,  after  the  preliminary  ques- 
tion shall  have  been  finally  determined. 

We  now  propose  to  restate,  as  briefly  as  possible,  the  general  facts  and  prin- 
ciples applicable  to  all  the  States  recently  in  rebellion : 

First.  The  seats  of  the  senators  and  representatives  from  the  so-called  Con- 
federate States  became  vacant  in  the  year  1861.  during  the  second  session  of 
the  thirty-sixth  Congress,  by  the  voluntary  withdrawal  of  their  incumbents, 
with  the  sanction  and  by  direction  of  the  legislatures  or  conventions  of  their 
respective  States.  This  was  done  as  a  hostile  act  against  the  Constitution  and 
Government  of  the  United  States,  with  a  declared  intent  to  overthrow  the  same 
by  forming  a  southern  confederation.  This  act  of  declared  hostility  was  speedily 
followed  by  an  organization  of  the  same  States  into  a  confederacy,  which  levied 
and  waged  war,  by  sea  and  land,  against  the  United  States.  This  war  continued 
more  than  four  years,  within  which  period  the  rebel  armies  besieged  the  na- 
tional capital,  invaded  the  loyal  States,  burned  their  towns  and  cities,  robbed 
their  citizens,  destroyed  more  than  250,000  loyal  soldiers,  and  imposed  an  in- 
creased national  burden  of  not  less  than  $3,500,000,000,  of  which  seven  or  eight 
hundred  millions  have  already  been  met  and  paid.  From  the  .time  these  con- 
federated States  thus  withdrew  their  representation  in  Congress  and  levied 
war  against  the  United  States,  the  great  mass  of  their  people  became  and  were 
insurgents,  rebels,  traitors,  and  all  of  them  assumed  and  occupied  the  political, 
legal,  and  practical  relation  of  enemies  of  the  United  States.  This  position  is 
established  by.  acts  of  Congress  and  judicial  decisions,  and  is  recognized  repeat- 
edly by  the  President  in  public  proclamations,  documents,  and  speeches. 

Second.  The  States  thus  confederated  prosecuted  their  war  against  the  United 
States  to  final  arbitrament,  and  did  not  cease  until  all  their  armies  were  cap- 
tured, their  military  power  destroyed,  their  civil  officers,  State  and  confederate, 
taken  prisoners  or  put  to  flight,  every  vestige  of  State  and  confederate  govern- 
ment obliterated,  their  territory  overrun  and  occupied  by  the  federal  armies,  and 
their  people  reduced  to  the  condition  of  enemies  conquered  in  war,  entitled  only 
by  public  law  to  such  rights,  privileges,  and  conditions  as  might  be  vouchsafed 
by  the  conqueror.  This  position  is  also  established  by  judicial  decisions,  and 
is  recognized  by  the  President  in  public  proclamations,  documents,  and  speeches. 

Third.  Having  voluntarily  deprived  themselves  of  representation  in  Congress 
for  the  criminal  purpose  of  destroying  the  Federal  Union,  and  having  reduced 
themselves,  by  the  act  of  levying  war,  to  the  condition  of  public  enemies,  they 
have  no  right  to  complain  of  temporary  exclusion  from  Congress ;  but,  on  the 
contrary  having  voluntarily  renounced  the  right  to  representation,  and  disqual- 
ified themselves  by  crime  from  participating  in  the  Government,  the  burden 
now  rests  upon  them,  before  claiming  to  be  reinstated  in  their  former  condition, 
to  show  that  they  are  qualified  to  resume  federal  relations.  In  order  to  do  this, 
they  must  prove  that  they  have  established,  with  the  consent  of  the  people,  re- 
publican forms  of  government  in  harmony  with  the  Constitution  and  laws  of  the 
United  States,  that  all  hostile  purposes  have  ceased,  and  should  give  adequate 
guarantees  against  future  treason  and  rebellion — guarantees  which  shall  prove 
satisfactory  to  the  government  against  which  they  rebelled,  and  by  whose  arms 
they  were  subdued. 


14  RECONSTRUCTION. 

Fourth.  Having,  by  this  treasonable  withdrawal  from  Congress,  and  by 
flagrant  rebellion  and  war,  forfeited  all  civil  and  political  rights  and  privileges 
under  the  federal  Constitution,  they  can  only  be  restored  thereto  by  the  permis- 
sion and  authority  of  that  constitutional  power  against  which  they  rebelled  and 
by  which  they  were  subdued. 

Fifth.  These  rebellious  enemies  were  conquered  by  the  people  of  the  United 
States,  acting  through  all  the  co-ordinate  branches  of  the  government,  and  not 
by  the  executive  department  alone.  The  powers  of  conqueror  are  not  so  vested 
in  the  President  that  he  can  fix  and  regulate  the  terms  of  settlement  and  con- 
fer congressional  representation  on  conquered  rebels  and  traitors.  Nor  can  he, 
in  any  way,  qualify  enemies  of  the  government  to  exercise  its  law-making  power. 
The  authority  to  restore  rebels  to  political  power  in  the  Federal  Government  can 
be  exercised  only  with  the  concurrence  of  all  the  departments  in  which  political 
power  is  vested ;  and  hence  the  several  proclamations  of  the  President  to  the 
people  of  the  Confederate  States  cannot  be  considered  as  extending  beyond  the 
purposes  declared,  and  can  only  be  regarded  as  provisional  permission  by  the 
commander-in-chief  of  the  army  to  do  certain  acts,  the  effect  and  validity  whereof 
is  to  be  determined  by  the  Constitutional  Government,  and  not  solely  by  the  ex- 
ecutive power. 

Sixth.  The  question  before  Congress  is,  then,  whether  conquered  enemies 
have  the  right,  and  shall  be  permitted  at  their  own  pleasure  and  on  their  own 
terms,  to  participate  in  making  laws  for  their  conquerors ;  whether  conquered 
rebels  may  change  their  theater  of  operations  from  the  battlefield,  where  they 
were  defeated  and  overthrown,  to  the  halls  of  Congress,  and,  through  their  rep- 
resentatives, seize  upon  the  Government  which  they  fought  to  destroy ;  whether 
the  national  treasury,  the  army  of  the  nation,  its  navy,  its  forts  and  arsenals,  its 
whole  civil  administration,  its  credit,  its  pensioners,  the  widows  and  orphans  of 
those  who  perished  in  the  war,  the  public  honor,  peace,  and  safety,  shall  all  be 
turned  over  to  the  keeping  of  its  recent  enemies  without  delay,  and  without 
imposing  such  conditions  as,  in  the  opinion  of  Congress,  the  security  of  the 
country  and  its  institutions  may  demand. 

Seventh.  The  history  of  mankind  exhibits  no  example  of  such  madness  and 
folly.  The  instinct  of  self-preservation  protests  against  it.  The  surrender  by 
Grant  to  Lee,  and  by  Sherman  to  Johnston,  would  have  been  disasters  of  less 
magnitude,  for  new  armies  could  have  been  raised,  new  battles  fought,  and  the 
Government  saved.  The  anti-coersive  policy,  which,  under  pretext  of  avoiding 
bloodshed,  allowed  the  rebellion  to  take  form  and  gather  force,  would  be  sur- 
passed in  infamy  by  the  matchless  wickedness  that  would  now  surrender  the 
halls  of  Congress  to  those  so  recently  in  rebellion  until  proper  precautions  shall 
have  been  taken  to  secure  the  national  faith  and  the  national  safety. 

Eighth.  As  has  been  shown  in  this  report,  and  in  the  evidence  submitted,  no 
proof  has  been  afforded  to  Congress  of  a  constituency  in  any  one  of  the  so-called 
Confederate  States,  unless  we  except  the  State  of  Tennessee,  qualified  to  elect 
senators  and  representatives  in  Congress.  No  State  Constitution,  or  amend- 
ment to  a  State  Constitution,  has  had  the  sanction  of  the  people.  All  the  so- 
called  legislation  of  State  Conventions  and  Legislatures  has  been  had  under  mil- 
itary dictation.  If  the  President  may,  at  his  will,  and  under  his  own  authority, 
whether  as  military  commander  or  chief  executive,  qualify  persons  to  appoint 
senators  and  elect  representatives,  and  empower  others  to  appoint  and  elect 
them,  he  thereby  practically  controls  the  organization  of  the  legislative  depart- 
ment. The  constitutional  form  of  government  is  thereby  practically  destroyed,. 
and  its  powers  absorbed  in  the  Executive.  And  while  your  committee  do  not 
for  a  moment  impute  to  the  President  any  such  design,  but  cheerfully  concede 
to  him  the  most  patriotic  motives,  they  cannot  but  look  with  alarm  upon  a  pre- 
cedent so  fraught  with  danger  to  the  Republic. 

Ninth.  The  necessity  of  providing  adequate  safeguards  for  the  future,  before 


REPORT    OF   THE   COMMITTEE.  15 

restoring  the  insurrectionary  States  to  a  participation  in  the  direction  of  public 
affairs,  is  apparent  from  the  bitter  hostility  to  the  Government  and  people  of 
the  United  States  yet  existing  throughout  the  conquered  territory,  as  proved 
incontestably  by  the  testimony  of  many  witnesses  and  by  undisputed  facts. 

Tenth.  The  conclusion  of  your  committee  therefore  is,  that  the  so-called  Con- 
federate States  are  not,  at  present,  entitled  to  representation  in  the  Congress  of 
the  United  States  ;  that,  before  allowing  such  representation,  adequate  security 
for  future  peace  and  safety  should  be  required ;  that  this  can  only  be  found  in 
such  changes  of  the  organic  law  as  s-hall  determine  the  civil  rights  and  privi- 
leges of  all  citizens  in  all  parts  of  the  Republic,  shall  place  representation  on  an 
equitable  basis,  shall  fix  a  stigma  upon  treason,  and  protect  the  loyal  people 
against  future  claims  for  the  expenses  incurred  in  support  of  rebellion  and  for 
manumitted  slaves,  together  with  an  express  grant  of  power  in  Congress  to 
enforce  those  provisions.  To  this  end  they  offer  a  joint  resolution  for  amending 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  the  two  several  bills  designed  to  carry 
the  same  into  effect,  before  referred  to. 

Before  closing  this  report,  your  committee  beg  leave  to  state  that  the  specific 
recommendations  submitted  by  them  are  the  result  of  mutual  concession,  after 
a  long  and  careful  comparison  of  conflicting  opinions.  Upon  a  question  of  such 
magnitude,  infinitely  important  as  it  is  to  the  future  of  the  Republic,  it  was  not 
to  be  expected  that  all  should  think  alike.  Sensible  of  the  imperfections  of  the 
scheme,  your  committee  submit  it  to  Congress  as  the  best  they  could  agree 
upon,  in  the  hope  that  its  imperfections  may  be  cured,  and  its  deficiencies  sup- 
plied, by  legislative  wisdom ;  and  that,  when  finally  adopted,  it  may  tend  to  re- 
store peace  and  harmony  to  the  whole  country,  and  to  place  our  republican  insti- 
tutions on  a  more  stable  foundation. 

W.  P.  FESSENDEN,         J.  M.  HOWARD,  JNO.  A.  BINGHAM, 

JAMES  W.   GRIMES,        GEORGE  H.  WILLIAMS,  ROSCOE  CONKLIXG, 

IRA  HARRIS,  THADDEUS  STEVENS,  GEORGE  S.  BOUTWELL. 

JUSTIN  S.  MORRILL, 


UNION  STATE  CENTRAL  COMMITTEE,  STATE  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

At  a  meeting  of  the  UNION  STATE  CENTRAL  COMMITTEE,  held  at  No.  623  Merchant 
street,  in  the  City  of  San  Francisco,  August  1st,  1866,  a  majority  of  the  Committee  being 
present,  the  following  resolutions  were  unanimously  adopted  : 

Resolved,  That  in  the  name  of  justice  and  liberty,  and  the  living  and  dead  heroes  of  the 
war — for  the  security  of  the  millions  who  shall  hereafter  people  this  great  land,  and  in  behalf 
of  the  universal  rights  of  man — we  earnestly  indorse  and  approve  of  the  following  proposed 
amendment  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  : 

JOINT  RESOLUTION  proposing  an  amendment  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States. 

Resolved  by  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States  of 
America  in  Congress  assembled  (two-thirds  of  both  Houses  concurring),  That  the 
following  Article  be  proposed  to  the  Legislatures  of  the  several  States,  as  an 
amendment  to  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,. which,  when  ratified  by 
three-fourths  of  said  Legislatures,  shall  be  valid  as  part  of  the  Constitution, 
namely : 

ARTICLE  14. 

SECTION  1.  All  persons  born  or  naturalized  in  the  United  States,  and  subject 
to  the  jurisdiction  thereof,  are  citizens  of  the  United  States  and  of  the  State 
wherein  they  reside.  No  State  shall  make  or  enforce  any  law  which  shall  abridge 
the  privileges  or  immunities  of  citizens  of  the  United  States  ;  nor  shall  any  State 
deprive  any  person  of  life,  liberty,  or  property,  without  due  process  of  law,  nor 
to  deny  to  any  person  within  its  jurisdiction  the  equal  protection  of  the  laws. 


16  RECONSTRUCTION. 

SEC.  2.  Representatives  shall  be  apportioned  among  the  several  States  ac- 
cording to  their  respective  numbers,  counting  the  whole  number  of  persons  in 
each  State,  excluding  Indians  not  taxed.  But  when  the  right  to  vote  at  any 
election  for  the  choice  of  electors  for  President  and  Vice  President  of  the  United 
States,  representatives  in  Congress,  the  executive  and  judicial  officers  of  a  State, 
or  the  members  of  the  Legislature  thereof,  is  denied  to  any  of  the  male  inhab- 
itants of  such  State,  being  twenty-one  years  of  age,  and  citizens  of  the  United 
States,  or  in  any  way  abridged,  except  for  participation  in  rebellion  or  other 
crime,  the  basis  of  representation,  therein  shall  be  reduced  in  the  proportion 
which  the  number  of  such  male  citizens  shall  bear  to  the  whole  number  of  male 
citizens  twenty-one  years  of  age  in  such  State. 

SEC.  3o  No  person  shall  be  a  senator  or  representative  in  Congress,  or  elector 
of  President  and  Vice  President,  or  hold  any  office,  civil  or  military,  under  the 
United  States,  or  under  any  State,  who,  having  previously  taken  an  oath  as  a 
member  of  Congress,  or  as  an  officer  of  the  United  States,  or  as  a  member  of  any 
State  Legislature,  or  as  an  executive  or  judicial  officer  of  any  State,  to  support 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  shall  have  engaged  in  insurrection  or  rebel- 
lion against  the  same,  or  given  aid  or  comfort  to  the  enemies  thereof.  But  Con- 
gress may,  by  a  vote  of  two-thirds  of  each  House,  remove  such  disability. 

SEC.  4.  The  validity  of  the  public  debt  of  the  United  States,  authorized  by 
law,  including  debts  incurred  for  payment  of  pensions  and  bounties  for  services 
in  suppressing  insurrection  or  rebellion,  shall  not  be  questioned.  But  neither 
the  United  \States  nor  any  State  shall  assume  or  pay  any  debt  or  obligation 
incurred  in  aid  of  insurrection  or  rebellion  against  the  United  States,  or  any 
claim  for  the  loss  or  emancipation  of  any  slave ;  but  all  such  debts,  obligations, 
and  claims,  shall  be  held  illegal  and  void. 

SEC.  5.  The  Congress  shall  have  power  to  enforce,  by  appropriate  legisla- 
tion, the  provisions  of  this  Article. 

Resolved,  That  until  such  amendment  is  adopted,  those  States  lately  in  rebellion  should  not 
be  admitted  to  representation  in  Congress ;  that  by  all  laws  the  victor  should  not  place  polit- 
ical power  in  the  hands  of  the  vanquished,  until  full  and  ample  guarantees  for  future  peace 
are  given  and  accepted  ;  that  the  people  who  have  waged  for  four  years  an  unjust  war  against 
the  Government,  cannot  complain  of  injustice  at  being  denied  the  opportunity  to  do  in  the 
halls  of  legislation  what  they  were  powerless  to  accomplish  on  the  field  of  battle. 

Resolved,  That  the  Union  party  of  California  are  opposed  to  any  legislation  or  to  any  policy 
in  Congress,  or  by  the  President,  which  shall  fall  short  of  a  full  settlement  of  the  question  of 
human  slavery,  in  fact  as  well  as  name,  throughout  our  whole  country ;  and  any  "  recon- 
struction," "  reorganization,"  or  "re-habiiitation,"  which  does  not  assure  to  the  whole  people, 
black  as  well  as  white,  "  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happiness,"  will  be  mischievous  in  its 
results,  and  a  full  admission  that  the  Republic  does  not  possess  the  genius  to  preserve  what  it 
had  the  valor  to  win. 

Resolved,  That  the  work  of  reconstruction  implies  a  moral  regeneration  of  disloyal  men 
and  parties,  and  should  be  carried  on  among  defeated  and  disorganized  rebels  and  rebel 
States,  rather  than  in  the  ranks  of  the  Union  party ;  that  the  Vallandighams,  the  Woods,  the 
Seymours,  who  are  active  in  promoting  a  Convention  at  Philadelphia,  and  who  it  is  certain 
are  to  participate  in  it,  are  not  fit  associates  for  loyal  men,  and  not  to  be  trusted  in  any  degree 
with  the  destinies  of  the  Republic ;  that  the  party  which  has  proved  capable  of  carrying  the 
country  successfully  through  years  of  bloody  war  may  safely  be  trusted  to  finish,  in  time  of 
peace,  the  work  yet  remaining  to  be  done  to  insure  the  permanency  of  pure  republican  insti- 
tutions in  America. 

Resolved,  That  we  approve  of  the  action  of  Congress,  and  of  our  Union  delegation  in  Con- 
gress, on  the  question  of  reconstruction,  and  that  any  course  less  "radical"  would  not  have 
met  the  approval  of  the  people  of  California. 

Resolved,  That  a  copy  of  the  foregoing  resolutions  be  transmitted  to  our  Union  delegation 
in  Congress,  and  published  in  the  Union  press  of  the  State. 
By  order  of  the  Committee. 

W.  H.  PARKS,  Chairman. 

ALFRED  BARSTOW,  Secretary. 


